Jones Officially on IR; Dolphins Makes Other Moves

Miami Dolphins safety Brandon Jones will be out at least four games after sustaining a knee injury in the Sunday night game against Pittsburgh

The Miami Dolphins made the expected move of putting safety Brandon Jones on injured reserve, one of four roster moves the team made Tuesday.

The other moves involved the practice squad, with the team signing DB Jamal Perry and WR Calvin Jackson and putting WR Freddie Swain on the practice squad injured list.

The big news here involved Jones, who head coach Mike McDaniel said Monday was headed to IR because of the knee injury he sustained in the 16-10 victory against the Pittsburgh Steelers at Hard Rock Stadium. In discussing Jones' injury Monday, McDaniel made reference to some "lingering college stuff" and said it was too soon to say whether Jones had a chance to come back at some point in the 2022 season.

His loss is just the latest blow to hit the Dolphins secondary, which has played all season without starting cornerback Byron Jones, lost slot corner Nik Needham to a season-ending Achilles injury, and played the Pittsburgh game without cornerbacks Kader Kohou and Keion Crossen.

Jones is the thumper in the Dolphins secondary and a great blitzer, and he produced one of the team's signature plays so far this season with his strip-sack of New England quarterback Mac Jones that Melvin Ingram turned into a touchdown in the 20-7 season-opening victory at Hard Rock Stadium.

With Jones out, the likelihood is the Dolphins will start veteran Eric Rowe opposite second-year star Jevon Holland at safety. The only other pure safety on the active roster at the moment is special teams standout Clayton Fejedelem.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

FOR EVEN MORE COVERAGE ON THE MIAMI DOLPHINS, CHECK OUT SPORTS ILLUSTRATED'S MIAMI DOLPHINS PAGE ON SI.COM.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE PRACTICE SQUAD MOVES

The two newcomers on the Dolphins practice squad should be familiar to the team's fans.

Perry played 31 games for the Dolphins the past three seasons, though his 2021 season was cut short by a knee injury in November and he didn't sign with any team this year after Miami declined to extend a qualifying offer as a restricted free agent.

Perry is a good special teams player with the versatility to line up at either safety or nickel corner in the secondary.

Jackson would be more familiar with older Dolphins fans because his father of the same name started 57 games at cornerback for Miami in the late 1990s.

The younger Jackson was released by the Jets practice squad before the start of the regular season. He was a second-team All-Pac-12 selection in 2021 after catching 66 passes for 987 yards (14.9 average) and seven touchdowns for Washington State.

Among his touchdowns was this highlight-reel play against Cal:

CALVIN. JACKSON. JR.

IMPOSSIBLE CATCH 🤯

(via @WSUCougarFB)pic.twitter.com/QyjtMdvErH

— Bleacher Report (@BleacherReport) October 2, 2021

Swain becomes the second player the Dolphins have placed on the practice squad injured list after edge defender Porter Gustin.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks for reading. Make sure to bookmark this site and check back daily for the latest Dolphins news and analysis year-round. Also, you can follow me on Twitter at @PoupartNFL, and that's where you can ask questions for the regular All Dolphins mailbags. You also can ask questions via email at fnalldolphins@yahoo.com.